An investigation of the social-affective effects resulting from appearance-related product models

This article proposes the concept of social-affective product design to address the effects of product features on personal interactions. Using eyeglass frames as the target product, this study included a factorial experiment to evaluate design features concerning personality traits signified by facial shapes. The experiment involved extracting three representative types of facial shapes by sorting 60 photographs and constructing three-dimensional models to rate attractiveness. The study then analyzed participant responses according to three social-affective measures: approachability, assertiveness, and masculinity, evoked by faces wearing factorized eyeglass frames. Results show that increasing the levels of certain design features strengthens the impression of specific personality traits. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.